The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at I'm Carol, Carl's wife. I feel almost as honored to be invited by Charlie to write this chapter as I felt when Carl invited me to be part of his family, which ultimately led to being part of the Gang. I remember when Carl first asked me out on a date. It was in the fall of our senior year of high school. By then Tim was a local hero, in the school as well as in all of Minneapolis.
And his brother was asking me for a date! I hoped that, at least, it would be fun and that maybe I'd get the chance to meet Tim and perhaps get to know him.
Well, I did get to meet Tim, and the whole family. But I soon realized that Carl was a pretty wonderful guy in his own right. He wasn't as athletic as Tim, but he was just as smart and just as nice. And, while Tim is really cute, Carl is handsome. Really handsome. Do I sound biased? Well, sure. But it's all true. Handsome, smart, nice. And soon he was falling in love with me. How could I ever have been so lucky? I had a pretty good relationship with my folks, and soon I had an even better one with Norman and Betsy.
They treated Carl and Tim as adults and equals, and Carl and Tim treated them the same way. I quickly became part of the family. I learned about Charlie, Tim's secret love. Charlie was this mysterious presence in the house. He was never there, but they worried about what he'd think, whether he'd like this or that, what he might be doing at any given time.
Soon Carl shared with me that Tim was gay and Charlie was his lover, sort of. That seemed strange because Tina was underfoot all the time, and clearly was Tim's lover. They were pretty open about a sexual relationship. One day Carl and I were driving in his car. I remember that we were headed over to St. Paul on some kind of date. Probably to see some local band.
